


Alone

by writer_bird



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Abusive Reginald Hargreeves, Angst, Drug Use, Ghosts, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Klaus Hargreeves Deserves Better, Klaus Hargreeves Needs A Hug, No Incest, One Shot, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-Canon, Reginald Hargreeves' A+ Parenting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-06
Updated: 2020-09-06
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:36:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,935
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26312014
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/writer_bird/pseuds/writer_bird
Summary: Klaus Hargreeves goes to get an MRI and it brings up some unwanted memories. Rated T for drugs and cursing. Spoilers for season one of umbrella academy.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 80





	Alone

Klaus’s heart beat abnormally fast, sitting there in that doctor’s office - although his heart was often beating abnormally fast. Side effect of all the drugs.

He didn’t like doctor’s offices. He wasn’t afraid of needles - not like Diego was - but everything was too sterile, too clean, too precise. Everything that Klaus was not.

Ben was sitting on the back of one of the chairs next to Klaus, fiddling his fingers.

“Calm down, man,” he said, noticing Klaus’s frantic look. “It’s a simple body scan.”

But both Ben and Klaus knew it was more than a simple body scan. To Klaus, at least.

Still.

Klaus appreciated Ben trying to defuse the tension. Even if he was failing miserably.

Klaus’s fingers itched for a joint, his hands longed to wrap around the coldness of a bottle. Anything to get his mind off this damn doctor’s visit. They’d told him in the pre-visit email that he wasn’t supposed to eat or drink anything for six hours before his visit, but of course he hadn’t listened.

He hadn’t been sober in fourteen years; he sure as hell wasn’t starting now just because a stupid doctor told him to.

Klaus was quite well practiced at ignoring doctors’ advice.

“Mr. Hargreeves?”

Klaus winced at the name. It didn’t fit him. He was Klaus, just Klaus, not  _ Mr. Hargreeves _ . That name belonged to someone else. Someone Klaus hadn’t seen in a while, since he’d left, but someone who he still hated to be reminded of.

It took him a minute to recognize that they were even addressing him, and even then Klaus just picked at the armrest of his chair. Why had he decided to come here in the first place? He should have just blown them off like he did everything else. But Ben’s pestering had gotten to him, he guessed. Ben was worried about Klaus, worried that something might be wrong with him after his last seizure, so he’d pressured him into this.

“Last time I listen to you,” Klaus muttered to Ben, earning him a strange side-eye from an elderly woman sitting next to him.

“Mr. Hargreeves?” The crisp voice called out again. Klaus jerked and looked up.

“Right! That’s me!” He was aware that his voice was slurring a little. Maybe if they realized he was drunk as hell they wouldn’t let him go through with this.

“You could at least try to act composed,” Ben said as Klaus staggered over to the nurse, ignoring his brother.

His heart thundered even faster as he followed the nurse down a long hallway. It was hard to breathe. He remembered following his dad down a hallway, out into the sunshine, and just for a minute he’d thought they were going to do what normal kids did - or so Klaus heard - and play ball, or something- until he’d been pushed through that damn, damn door, and it had swung closed, and he was left alone. Alone with the corpses and the screams.

“Klaus, snap out of it.” Ben’s voice was layered with worry, and Klaus laughed dryly.

“Shuttup.”

“I’m sorry?” The nurse’s eyebrows raised; Klaus couldn’t tell if she looked more offended or more concerned.

“‘S nothing,” Klaus said, waving a hand.

She held open the door to a room, and Klaus meandered in as if this was any old room, on any old day.

“Sit down and I’ll take your basic information down,” the nurse said. “Before we go to the MRI room.”

_ The MRI room. _ Ben had warned him what the MRI would consist of, and so those three words send an unwanted chill down Klaus’s spine.

He wasn’t drunk or high enough for this.

“Sir-”

“Klaus,” Klaus corrected.

“Klaus, are you intoxicated?” the nurse asked.

“I told you,” Ben said in a sing-song voice. Klaus ignored him again.

“No,” he said, pouting a little. “Of course not. Doctor said not to drink or eat.”

The nurse looked like she wanted to say something in response to that, then considered it and seemed to decide that it wasn’t worth it. She shook her head and pulled out a clipboard. She fired off the rote questions. What medicine he was on, recent illnesses, etc. etc. etc.

He lied about most of them. If he’d really said all the drugs he was on, he thought she’d check him into rehab right then and there, and he had no need to go back. He’d just got out for the third time. It never helped.

Rehab couldn’t make  _ them _ be quiet. Only drugs could do that.

And then she took his pulse. It squeezed, squeezed, squeezed around his arm, and God, he didn’t like it. It was too reminiscent of dear old dad’s tight grip around his arm while he yelled at him.

_ ”Stupid, lazy, child,” Reginald snapped in that way of his, shaking Klaus a little. “You have no idea the potential you have, if you only put in a little effort.” _

_ Klaus tried to pull his arm away. “Dad, I don’t want to. I just want them to be quiet. They-” _

_ “Scare you, yes, you’ve said. Over, and over, and over again. We will just need to remedy that.” _

“Klaus!” Ben, snapping him out of it again.

_ Damn, I’m messed up _ , Klaus thought briefly, giggling to himself. The nurse shot him another look over her shoulder, but Klaus got the feeling she just wanted to be done with him as soon as possible.

_ Story of my life, isn’t it? _

The MRI machine didn’t look as bad as he had been picturing it in his head. It was white and somewhat rounded, with a tray and a thin cot-like mattress on it. The nurse directed Klaus to sit down on the cot.

“The doctor will be in in a moment,” she said, and whisked out of the room.

The room was white and crisp and clean and sterile, just like the waiting room, just like the room where she’d taken down his information. He hated it. God, he hated it. It reminded him of the little infirmary in the mansion where mom always stitched up his wounds from training. Bad memories. Bad memories he drowned in drink and drugs. He realized his fingers were twitching and forced them to be still. Just a few minutes in here, a few papers signed and a bill sent over to the mansion - someone would pay for it, Dad or Allison or somebody, Klaus didn’t care - and then he’d be out of here and could go get as high as the goddamn Empire State building, if he wanted to. Which he did.

The doctor came in. He was pretty handsome, and Klaus resisted the urge to flirt with him if only because he wanted this over with as soon as possible. The doctor directed Klaus to lie down on the cot - again, it took all of his extremely limited willpower not to make an innuendo - and then told Klaus how it would work.

“You need to lie as still as possible,” the doctor said. “It’s going to be loud.”

“Calm down, doc,” Klaus said. His heart thundered. His fingers gripped the sides of the cot.

“And relax,” the doctor said, noting Klaus’s tensed muscles. “It’s perfectly safe.”

_ Yeah, for you,  _ Klaus thought. Thoughts were starting to race through his head. This was a bad idea. This was a bad idea. MRIs were totally safe and fine, yeah, for  _ normal people _ . Klaus wasn’t normal. Maybe the MRI would mess with his head because of his powers. Maybe it would make them worse. Maybe it would get rid of them. That wouldn’t be so bad, the constant jabbering would be gone without drugs to banish them, but that would mean Ben would be gone too, and that wasn’t a trade Klaus was prepared to make.

Just before the doctor pressed the button to slide Klaus into the machine -  _ oh God oh God oh God oh God oh God _ \- Klaus asked, “hey Doc, how long is this going to take?”

“We’re just doing a brain scan for you,” the doctor said.

_ Good, so this won’t be that long- _

“So only about 45 minutes. Ready?”

Klaus’s breath caught in his throat.  _ Forty-five minutes _ ?

“You are the worst,” he said to Ben, who had the decency to look ashamed and concerned.

“You’re going to be okay,” Ben said. It sounded like he was trying to convince himself along with Klaus.

Klaus resisted the urge to give Ben the finger, knowing how it would look to the doctor, who was already looking offended.

“I’m sorry, it’s procedure,” he said. “Another procedure is we will need to strap your head down. This is to keep minimal movement so that the brain scans are clear.”

Klaus’s stomach turned over but he nodded. How was it he already couldn’t breathe? God, he was not high enough for this.

The doctor strapped Klaus’s head down. There were about fifty different jokes running through Klaus’s head at the moment, but he was in no mood to voice any of them.

“Ready?” The doctor asked.

“So ready,” Klaus said, trying to grin. He felt slightly nauseous.

The doctor nodded, and pressed the button. The table holding Klaus slowly slid into the machine.

It wasn’t entirely dark inside; there were a few bulbs not unlike night lights. But the ceiling of the MRI machine was  _ right _ overhead. There wasn’t even room for Klaus to raise his arms or move them to the sides. His head couldn’t move either, strapped down as it was. That was the worst part. Panic began setting in almost immediately.

“Alright, Klaus, I’m turning it on now.” That was the doctor’s voice. Klaus closed his eyes, then opened them again. He didn’t know which was worse.

And then the humming sound started up. Loud, it filled his ears.

His ears, filled with sound. His body, confined in the small space.

He felt nauseous. It was all too familiar.

_ He was curled up in the corner of the crypt, hands clamped over his ears as the ghosts screamed and screamed and screamed. They were in his face if he opened his eyes, so he just kept his eyes closed, but he felt their closeness, sensed it. _

_ “Free us,” they screamed. “Save us, avenge us, talk to us, hear us, listen, listen, listen.” Over and over again. They screamed at him and clawed at him, hands passing through him leaving chills. “Klaus,” they wailed. “Klausssss!” The crypt was dark and clammy and cold, and he was alone, so, so alone. The others were probably off playing somewhere, but Klaus was in the crypt. He wasn’t sure how long he’d been in there. Dad had said five hours to start with, to get rid of his fear, but it felt like longer. He was hungry, he was thirsty, he was cold and sore, but most of all, he was alone alone alone alone alone alone. _

“Klaus,” he heard Ben’s voice from a distance, far, far away. It didn’t help this time.

He was alone alone alone alone and any minute the ghosts were going to come for him, they were going to come and they were never going to leave, and he’d be in here, trapped, forever.

_ “Dad, please, I’m not scared anymore, please just let me out.” _

_ Cold silence from Reginald as he considered, and then:”Three more hours.” _

_ The slamming of the crypt door. The abrupt plunge back into darkness, and Klaus screamed and cried. _

He couldn’t cry now. He couldn’t scream. He had to stay still.

That was the worst part. Walls all around him, and he couldn’t move.

His pulse thundered. His blood pressure was probably off the charts; this was definitely a claustrophobia attack. His palms were slick with sweat - hell, everywhere sweated - and his head spun.

_ Alone alone alone alone alone. _

Any minute now the ghosts were going to come for him.

His head spun. He couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t focus on anything but the walls all around him. Were they coming closer? They were definitely constricting.

Was this what death felt like?

Training with Reginald had been hell, yeah. The endless physical trails, the training,  _ God, the ballroom dancing _ , it had all been hell, but the crypt had been some of the worst. Alone with his fears. Alone with the screaming - they screamed and wailed so much that his ears bled on one of the worst days. Alone in the dark, pressed in the corner up in a wall.

Alone.

“Klaus, you’re not alone,” Ben was shouting. “Take a deep breath. You can do this! You’re in the worst of it right now”

His voice seemed to come through water. It was a distant fog.

Alone.

His throat was closing up. His head was spinning and he felt like he might throw up.

_ How did Dad mess me up this bad? Why?  _ The questions swam through his head through the haze of it all. Because, really, it was entirely Reginald’s fault.

He really was a lousy excuse for a father.

Well, Klaus was a lousy excuse for a superhero, wasn’t he? The  _ Umbrella Academy _ . Yeah right. It was Luther and Diego and Allison and Ben who did all of the interesting stuff. Klaus? And Vanya? They were the losers who couldn’t fight. Vanya stayed at home and practiced her violin while the others went out on missions, and Klaus was shut in the crypt, day after goddamn day after goddamn day. Overnight, sometimes.

The longest he spent in that crypt in a row was three days.

That night after he was let out was the first night he snuck into dad’s liquor cabinet.

And when he finally,  _ finally  _ convinced dad that he wasn’t afraid anymore - it took him hours of practice in front of a mirror to make his lie convincing enough - and he was released from day after day in the crypt - well, then they were on to “actual training”.

_ I’m a mess,  _ Klaus thought. He thought he might throw up. He stuffed a scream down. He was going to make it through this MRI if it killed him.

At the moment, it felt like it might.

The thundering of his heart in his ears had completely drowned out Ben. It was almost drowning out the MRI machine, too.

And then, it all stopped. The MRI machine stopped thundering. The tray slid out slowly, clicking back into place in its original position. The bright fluorescent lights of the room thundered down on Klaus. He realized that his face was wet with tears and he sat up and wiped them off, feeling dizzy and disoriented, his body swaying slightly.

“I think you were having a panic attack, Klaus,” the doctor said, coming over to stand next to Klaus, concern painted all over his face. He reached down and unstrapped Klaus’s head. “Perhaps we should apply a sedative.”

Klaus wasn’t accustomed to concern and pity. Everyone, even his siblings, just thought he was a lame-ass drug addict, so why would they feel bad for him?

He didn’t know how to deal with the look that the doctor was giving him.

“Do you have a history of claustrophobia?” the doctor asked, his tone soft. He probably thought he was being gentle. It just reminded Klaus of Luther’s constant condescension.

_ Do I have a history of claustrophobia.  _ What kind of question was that?

Klaus wanted to scream. He wanted to throw something. Punch something. Break something. Preferably Reginald. Or whoever had let that sicko adopt a bunch of children in the first place.

Instead he grinned at the doctor. “You know, you’re cute, but you’re not my type,” he said, giggling a little.  _ Why the hell was he giggling when he felt like crying? _ He booped the doctor on the nose and pranced past him out the door of the room.

“Mr. Hargreeves!” he heard voices calling behind him. “Mr. Hargreeves!”

Klaus didn’t stop. He barrelled out of the doctor’s office as fast as possible, Ben following behind silently. Silent because he disapproved or silent because he felt bad, Klaus didn’t know, and at the moment he didn’t care.

He beelined straight for his favorite dealer.

That night, Klaus slept on a roof. The buildings were too close. Sometimes the sky felt too close, but that night was a cloudless one, and so the roof was what he needed.

Ben sat next to him. He was a ghost. Ghosts didn’t need to sleep.

They were silent, neither of them talking about the events of the day. That wasn’t how Klaus worked. He didn’t talk. He didn’t share.

He pushed the feelings down and covered them and held them at bay, like he held off the spirits, with drugs and alcohol.

Just before he fell asleep, he hallucinated. It was from one of the drugs the dealer gave him - he didn’t know or care which.

It felt more like a dream. It was a future where he was happy. He’d found a boyfriend, a great guy, a cute guy, a guy who listened and knew not to shove him in crypts or closets or to yell at him too loud. They were living together in New York. They had a puppy. Klaus didn’t see any ghosts. Not ever. Reginald was long dead and couldn’t bother Klaus any more.

Mundane stuff, really. But it was a beautiful dream, and when Klaus woke up to see the sky stretching above him, and cold concrete beneath him and the ghost of his brother sitting beside him, he could have just about died.

He fell asleep crying silently.

  
  



End file.
